Cars I Have Known

I am driving around in brand spanking new Toyota Corolla and enjoying the smell of a new car and the feeling that I m going to get to my destination on time. This was always problematic with the Chevrolet Blazer that preceded it. I will swear that I logged more miles behind a tow truck than useful miles in the last few months before the Blazer became a trade-in. But to it's credit, the Blazer was twelve years old and ready for the big scrap yard in the sky

But this got me to thinking about the cars I have owned and how they, in a sense, reflect where I was at a particular phase of my life. For example, my first car was a 1932 Ford Model B coupe which my Dad bought for me after a winning day at the horse races. It was a perfect car for teenager who did not know anything about cars and whose sole commitment to basic maintenance was to wipe the windshield from time to time.

My second car came after I returned from Navy service after World War II ( yes, I’m that old!). It was an orange 1938 Mercury convertible. I fitted it out with twin mufflers and a set of ripple disk wheel covers. But I soon found out that putting the top down in the hot California sun was not as glamorous as it appeared in the movies.

Following the Mercury, due to demands of a growing family, there was a spate of nondescript no-character cars whose main job was hauling kids and groceries around. The brightest spot during this period was the acquisition of a second car, one that I always dreamed of but could never quite justify in my mind --- an MG-TD convertible roadster. It was sheer pleasure to join the sports car fraternity and buzz around town waving to other sports car aficionados.

But the era of the sports car lasted only a couple years until a cracked crankshaft relegated the MG to the scrapheap to be replaced by a totally unhip Plymouth two door coupe. The family car, however, continued to be succession of station wagons, an Aero Star van that leaked oil like a sieve, a Ford Explorer, and ultimately the aforementioned Chevrolet Blazer which I hoped would last forever. And it almost did, until it developed a mysterious ailment which caused it to die at the most inconvenient times. When my mechanic finally threw in the towel and told me there was no remedy, I knew it was time to admit defeat and invest in a new vehicle.

So I threw in the towel as well, in a manner of speaking, and got the most dependable, gas efficient, and prosaic car I could think of --- a Toyota Corolla. I guess that will curtail my trolling for chicks but at least I will get to where I’m going.